Anna PereraRezensionen

Fifteen-year-old Aaron is an impoverished Coptic Christian in Egypt, a Zabbaleen, who spends his days digging through garbage to find broken glass that he can resell in order to survive. Author’s Note.

This is the gut-wrenching story of Kha - lid, a teenage boy from the UK, who is kidnapped by the CIA while visiting rel - atives in Pakistan. Innocent, yet accused of being a terrorist, Khalid is tortured and eventually transferred to Guantan - amo Bay, not knowing if he will ever get home again

The writing is amazing. The author creates such vivid imagery that awakens all of your senses. Even though this is Aaron's voice, it is uneven to the point of being unrelated stories. I found it hard to follow and only kept reading because I loved the writing. The ending is thought provoking.

Pros: Exceptional, sensory writing will draw you into an unknown but very real world. The journey is jaw-dropping and will give you a lot to think about.

Read whether we recommend buying or borrowing this book in the full review at The Reading Tub®. You can add your review, too.

Amazon summary: Fifteen-year-old Aaron lives amongst the rubbish piles in the slums of Cairo. His job? To collect broken glass. His life? Wasted. His hope? To find a future he can believe in. Today in Cairo, Egypt, there is a city within a city: a city filled with garbage--literally. As one of the Zabbaleen people, Aaron makes his living sorting through waste. When his family kicks him out, his only alternatives are to steal, beg, or take the most nightmarish garbage-collecting job of all. Perera- author of Guantanamo Boy. Pair with 'Trash' by Andy Mulligan. Both deal with children surviving on rubbish and waste. One set in Egypt and one set in India.½

social understanding, Egypt, realistic fiction

The Glass Collector by Anna Perera follows Aaron, a Zabbaleen (Coptic Christian) teen. The Zabbaleens are the garbage collectors of Egypt. They collect it in horse drawn carriages and recycle it and feed the food scraps to their live stock (pigs).

The book opens with Aaron believing he sees the Virgin Mary in in the glass of one of the tourist hotels. That strong opening with a hint of magical realism set up expectations for the direction this novel was going to take. But after that initial sighting, the book settles into a far more mundane routine of collecting garbage, talking about family (the good and bad of it) and thinking about girls.

Aaron begins to steel perfume instead of collecting the empty bottles. Of course his thievery (while completely understandable given his situation) has consequences.

While the descriptions working with garbage and living in extreme poverty are well done, the tone of the book remains flat. There's no ebb and flow to the emotional impact. Aaron does his thing but he never truly comes alive.

Khalid is a 15-year-old British boy of Asian descent. Born and raised in Rochester, computer-mad Khalid is unhappy that his parents are taking him to Pakistan for a family funeral. But like them he little suspects that making such a trip in early 2002 will have dangerous consequences. Kidnapped, held for several months and tortured in several of the notorious 'secret' CIA prisons, Khalid is eventually transported to Guantanamo Bay. There, along with the other orange-suited inmates, he is subjected to further interrogations, indignities and the mind-numbing routine of a life without meaningful human contact or affection. Losing his faith in humanity and nearly losing his mind altogether, Khalid is eventually given access to a lawyer, thanks to the efforts of his family and friends back home. More than two years after he was first kidnapped, Khalid is released and allowed to go home.
A really compelling novel. A little slow in a couple of scenes when Khalid is gradually loosing his mind in prison, but otherwise excellent. Ends on a positive note when Khalid returns to his old high school and talks about his experiences. The message is one of tolerance and acceptance of all people, no matter what they look like.

What a promising book this was! It did not deliver, though-- at least not to me-- and is not one that I will be recommending to our students. They will not suffer the confusing, scattered plot, the odd, random switches in narration and even the main topic, which involves Coptic Christians in Egypt called the Zabbaleen who collect and recycle the garbage for their livelihood. Perera had a unique idea and setting here, but she is way too heavy-handed. It may all be true, but the last thing a young person wants to be hit over the head repeatedly with is squalid living conditions, the smell and feel of constantly being surrounded by garbage, and the overwhelming feeling that there’s no way out. And then the ending! Ugh, so not happy. The more I think back on it, the more of a downer this book was.
But a quick synopsis-- Aaron is a Zabbaleen who collects glass to help feed his step family. His mother passed away a few years ago, and Aaron has been living tenuously with these people who don’t really like him at all. Aaron feels very trapped in Mokattam, the Zabbaleen town outside Cairo; he cannot attend school anymore because he must sort garbage, and he is destined to this life in this garbage-saturated town through the class system. He begins to steal beautiful bottles from a perfume shop and is eventually caught. Aaron learns that his life can get much, much worse. He is cast out by his step family, heads to the lowest rung (medical-waste collecting), and is the town pariah (they want him to confess and ask for forgiveness-- Aaron is defiant). There’s a love interest that blossoms and, at the end and with the help of the local artist, Aaron decides his life as a glass collector married to Rachel is all he wants, and Mokattam isn’t so bad, and he settles down to live out his life.
Yuk! :) As I said, I do not recommend this book, even though it had some excellent messages about class systems, and most especially, the waste we generate and how much of it could be reusable. I give it two unenthusiastic stars, mostly because of the previous statement.

A chilling and harrowing story of a young victim of a profound injustice brought about by paranoia, prejudice, and an appalling disregard for human rights. This novel left me angry and disgusted. It should be widely read and discussed.

Western readers are likely to be completely unfamiliar with the marginalized community of which fifteen-year-old Aaron is a member and the bleak, hard-scrabble existence they are forced to live. A vividly written, often moving story of hope and redemption in a most unusual setting.

This was simpy a fantastic read. I read it cover to cover in one sitting.

This book is so far out of what I normally read. I don't read a lot of these 'issues' books written for teens. I feel they are usually over-done to say the least. This story is not in the same league as anything like those. This book is about an English-born Pakistani boy who leads the life of most normal English boys. He very rarely has seen the hate that is directed at Muslims or Pakistanis until he visits his own homeland, Pakistan.

Together with his parents he travels to Pakistan, where he is caught up in events which are really beyond his control and before he knows it he has been kidnapped by US forces believing him to be a terrorist and he eventually finds himself in Guantanamo Bay.

This is a harrowing tale, which had me completely engrossed in this young man's life. The emotions and trauma displayed by this young man have been portrayed so realisticly, I felt like I was experiencing them with him. I don't want to go into detail as it would be more than spoilers, they would ruin the storyline for people who want to read it.

I NEVER thought I would read anything like this, but it was so highly recommended by book reviewers here in NZ, I just had to find out what they thought was so wonderful.

This is NOT a tale of American bashing or pro-muslim (which I thought it would be at first). It is a true-to-life story(the authors' note says it is "inspired by real events".) that has certainly got me looking at things in a new way. This story is scary and wonderful, harrowing and moving and a book that I recommend to everyone.

I am a 44 year-old, white christian woman and yet I was moved to tears and to a stronger understanding of those people in this world who, though they might believe differently than me, want and desire the same things I do. A must read for everyone over the age of 14 no matter their race, creed, colour or religion.

This was simpy a fantastic read. I read it cover to cover in one sitting.

This book is so far out of what I normally read. I don't read a lot of these 'issues' books written for teens. I feel they are usually over-done to say the least. This story is not in the same league as anything like those. This book is about an English-born Pakistani boy who leads the life of most normal English boys. He very rarely has seen the hate that is directed at Muslims or Pakistanis until he visits his own homeland, Pakistan.

Together with his parents he travels to Pakistan, where he is caught up in events which are really beyond his control and before he knows it he has been kidnapped by US forces believing him to be a terrorist and he eventually finds himself in Guantanamo Bay.

This is a harrowing tale, which had me completely engrossed in this young man's life. The emotions and trauma displayed by this young man have been portrayed so realisticly, I felt like I was experiencing them with him. I don't want to go into detail as it would be more than spoilers, they would ruin the storyline for people who want to read it.

I NEVER thought I would read anything like this, but it was so highly recommended by book reviewers here in NZ, I just had to find out what they thought was so wonderful.

This is NOT a tale of American bashing or pro-muslim (which I thought it would be at first). It is a true-to-life story(the authors' note says it is "inspired by real events".) that has certainly got me looking at things in a new way. This story is scary and wonderful, harrowing and moving and a book that I recommend to everyone.

I am a 44 year-old, white christian woman and yet I was moved to tears and to a stronger understanding of those people in this world who, though they might believe differently than me, want and desire the same things I do. A must read for everyone over the age of 14 no matter their race, creed, colour or religion.

This was simpy a fantastic read. I read it cover to cover in one sitting.

This book is so far out of what I normally read. I don't read a lot of these 'issues' books written for teens. I feel they are usually over-done to say the least. This story is not in the same league as anything like those. This book is about an English-born Pakistani boy who leads the life of most normal English boys. He very rarely has seen the hate that is directed at Muslims or Pakistanis until he visits his own homeland, Pakistan.

Together with his parents he travels to Pakistan, where he is caught up in events which are really beyond his control and before he knows it he has been kidnapped by US forces believing him to be a terrorist and he eventually finds himself in Guantanamo Bay.

This is a harrowing tale, which had me completely engrossed in this young man's life. The emotions and trauma displayed by this young man have been portrayed so realisticly, I felt like I was experiencing them with him. I don't want to go into detail as it would be more than spoilers, they would ruin the storyline for people who want to read it.

I NEVER thought I would read anything like this, but it was so highly recommended by book reviewers here in NZ, I just had to find out what they thought was so wonderful.

This is NOT a tale of American bashing or pro-muslim (which I thought it would be at first). It is a true-to-life story(the authors' note says it is "inspired by real events".) that has certainly got me looking at things in a new way. This story is scary and wonderful, harrowing and moving and a book that I recommend to everyone.

I am a 44 year-old, white christian woman and yet I was moved to tears and to a stronger understanding of those people in this world who, though they might believe differently than me, want and desire the same things I do. A must read for everyone over the age of 14 no matter their race, creed, colour or religion.

I found this book compelling and quite disturbing. Khalid is a British kid visiting extended family in Pakistan. He's taken into custody as a terrorist. Interrogated, tortured, and abused, he signs a confession to stop the suffering and finds himself sent to Guantanamo. The unjustice riled me up, but I had to keep reading to see if anyone would listen and help Khalid.½

Guantanamo Boy (Albert Whitman, 2011 reprint) is the story of a teenager in the wrong place at the wrong time in a dangerous political climate. It’s a story of closed ears, fearful eyes and silent mouths. A story in which the small kindnesses buried deep in the heart have the power to keep a person alive, like the power of a good book (a Reader’s Digest copy of To Kill A Mockingbird read over and over again) or a piece of chocolate. Perera doesn’t just explore the fragility of individual rights but the fragility of the human soul. Her protagonist is the most innocent of them all, a mere child.

Though Khalid knows there’s a war on and has heard stories of Muslims suddenly disappearing, he can’t believe that any of it could happen to anyone he knows, much less happen directly to him. His outlook mimics our own post-9/11 cultural shock. War? What war? Not here, not in our backyard. After all, Khalid is just a teenage boy from England so why should he be concerned? He likes to hang out with his friends, play computer games and follow the Rochdale soccer team. He wishes he had the nerve to talk to pretty girls, or one particular classmate named Niamh. Khalid didn’t even want to go with his family to Pakistan and help his aunties move house. He wanted to stay home and play the computer game his cousin Tariq developed. He doesn’t speak Arabic or perform the traditional calls to prayer; he feels no affiliation to his native and familial religion aside from occasional Friday prayers at dinner. If Khalid wasn’t Muslim, the injustices and cruelty which quickly confront him… wouldn’t have happened. There would be no story of torture and survival to tell. But because Khalid got caught in a crowd during a protest in Karachi and wore the wrong clothing, he’s stolen from his family in the middle of the night and taken without charge to Guantanamo Bay. Author Anna Perera makes one thing clear with this novel: no person should suffer what her fictional character experiences in, and getting to, Guantanamo. But plenty do and it’s not a tragic work of fiction that children like Khalid suffered in the ways that Perera has researched and imagined. Though the numbers are disputed, several children have been locked up and tortured at Guantanamo Bay like dangerous terrorists and enemy informants.

Khalid’s experiences in Guantanamo, from start to finish, are astonishing. The possibility of reality – of his fictional experience based on a true, lived experience – is terrifying. How could anyone allow it to happen? Not just to an adult, but to a child! Remember all those news reports on water-boarding that sickened and disturbed us from the comfort of our couches? Rated as highly graphic on CNN and censored on the evening news? Watch any documentary exposé from the last five years and you can’t help but wonder how any rational soldier could abide by and utilize such interrogation practices. When Khalid experiences it – when Perera writes it – I had to put the story down. My stomach was cramped, my head dizzy. Enough, my body said. And yet I had to pick up the book and finish the story. I had to find out what happens because it couldn’t possibly be real. Because Khalid ought to be preparing for college entrance exams and asking Niamh out, not sitting in a cage dreaming of a James Bond-worthy escape. Khalid repeats, over and over again, the same strain: why am I here and how could anyone think I am a terrorist? I’m just a kid. Call my school. Call my parents. Ask them, ask anybody!

No one listens. That’s the red flag, the danger. Listening to each other, sharing stories, empathizing with your fellow man is the human aspect of humanity. The power of good fiction is its ability to suck you in and to feel like the protagonist is sitting there, on your bed, telling you his or her story. You can’t help but empathize and feel concerned. It’s a complicit act on part of the reader to trust the narrator and protagonist and recognize their words in the suspension of disbelief. As a protagonist, Khalid accrues reader empathy in spades. And while Guantanamo Boy doesn’t quite fit the bill of absorbing, compelling fiction à la Phillip Pullman or Suzanne Collins – I lost focus a few times, the action lagged and dragged in the middle sections, and the final chapter concluded with too much joyful familial pomp and fair for my liking – I give it a pass for its effort and agenda. Aside from my small grievances, I believe this story would have flourished if it were a graphic novel. Nothing hits home harder than images of human suffering and some of Perera’s sections begged to be drawn. I could just picture the warehouse where Khalid stayed for weeks waiting in transit, like a dog in a wire mesh cage. That scene deserved visual expression. With abuses and crimes like Khalid’s, words don’t capture enough (and it is clear Perera is trying).

It’s a story that needs to be shared. No one can finish Guantanamo Boy with a cold heart. The story is a call to action and homage to the suffering of thousands of innocents quarantined and labeled enemy combatants. The message of the book may be peace but it is hard not to get angry. The important thing, however, is that young readers are aware of the situation and understand its importance. I believe Guantanamo will haunt Americans for centuries, not only as an institution but as a foreign policy. As of March 2011, the U.S. military installation on Guantanamo is still open (despite President Obama’s promises). Some 171 people remain and, like Khalid, they have been refused basic human rights. Broken down and treated like animals, by animals.

This is a powerful story. The author has taken the events of 9/11 and shown us how the events thereafter were just a horrific. Khalid is a fifteen-year-old boy in England. He and his family go to Pakistan to help his aunts find a place to move. His father ventures off to look at a rental and doesn’t return. His mother sends Khalid to the same address to look for his father. He doesn’t find him. On his way back to his aunt’s house he is caught up physically in a demonstration. He manages to make his way back to his aunt’s home. Later that evening men in black break into the house and kidnap him. He is accused of being a terrorist and eventually sent to Guantanamo Bay. His family has no idea at first what has happened to him. The book details his abuse and torture while imprisoned. It seems obvious the author of the book did not like the Bush administration. I can overlook that in this book. What I could not overlook was the fact that although this book is fiction, we know that young innocent children and teens were abducted and accused of being terrorists and sent to Guantanamo. We also have knowledge of the humiliation, abuse and torture that took place. The author was not afraid to speak out about these atrocities. If we hide things like these from our children then they will repeat our mistakes. This is a bitter pill to swallow. However, I remember my parents telling me about the Japanese-Americans being sent to interment camps here in the United States. We learned nothing. After 9/11 we looked at people of a different nationality and different religion and decided, or judged them based on those two factors. Although I would not recommend this to my sixth graders because of the graphic nature of it, I would recommend it to seventh grade and up. The book has a timeline of events in the back, several sources to check the information and the most wonderful questions. To me the questions were so thought provoking that they could be used not just for this book but for the topic of terrorism and family and many other things. This has been one of the better books I have read this summer. It is not a light read. It stands at over 300 pages and reads quickly, but the topic itself is heavy. I found myself crying often at the injustice. The author definitely has a way with words to say the least.

"We must remember that once we divide the world into good and bad, then we have to join one camp or the other, and, as you've found out, life's a bit more complex than that."

With the worldwide paranoia and fear of terrorism as a backdrop for Guantanamo Boy, Anna Perera has crafted an entirely plausible story about a 15-year-old British boy, Khalid, from Rochdale, a large town in Greater Manchester, England.

Khalid is much like any other boy from his town, interested in good grades, his mates, soccer ("footy"), girls, and online gaming. Though his family is Muslim, Khalid is a casual practitioner. When his family visits Pakistan to assist an aunt, Khalid's father inexplicably disappears. Khalid goes to check the address where his father was last seen, threading his way through a street protest enroute. Unable to find his father, he returns to his aunt's home where he is later kidnapped in the late night hours,

"Surely only his dad could be coming through the door without knocking this time of night?

But he's badly mistaken. Blocking the hallway is a gang of fierce-looking men dressed in dark shalwar kameez. Black cloths wrapped around their heads. Black gloves on their hands. Two angry blue eyes, the rest brown, burn into Khalid as the figures move towards him like cartoon gangsters with square bodies. Confused by the image, he staggers, bumping backwards into the wall. Arms up to stop them getting nearer. Too shocked and terrified to react as they shoulder him to the kitchen and close the door before pushing him to his knees and waving a gun at him as if he's a violent criminal. Then vice-like hands clamp his mouth tight until they plaster it with duct tape. No chance to wonder what the hell is going on, let alone scream out loud."

And so begins Khalid's descent into a frightening labyrinth of secret prisons, interrogation rooms, and finally Guantanamo Bay detention center.

A few lengthy passages are didactic in nature, but they are few in number. Khalid's unique perspective as a boy, a British citizen and non-practicing Muslim of Pakistani descent, offers a superb vantage point into the previously termed War on Terror. His sensibilities are Western, his concerns are adolescent, his perspective is that of outsider - he has known discrimination in England, he is too Western for his Pakistani relatives, he has little in common with his fellow inmates. Khalid is the perfect protagonist for this third-person narrative.

Heart-wrenching and frighteningly enlightening, Guantanmo Boy is not without bright spots - the power of small acts of kindness, the love of family, the virtue of forgiveness. A thought-provoking read for teens and young adults.
www.shelf-employed.blogspot.com

Review to follow...

Khalid is a normal Muslim, English boy who likes to hang out with his friends, annoy his younger siblings and play video games. When vacationing in Pakistan with his family, he is kidnapped and jailed because apparently he is a suspected terrorist. He is tortured, starved and interrogated for two years. Time and again he tells the guards that he is not a terrorist but they do not believe him. While being water boarded, he confesses to what they believe about him, just to make the torture stop.

Guantanamo Boy is a gripping read. Taken away from his family for no reason other then he is Muslim makes this story a powerful read. What Khalid went through is a true story for many boys and something that I had no idea even occurred. Hundreds of young boys, some as young as twelve, were suspected of being terrorists and tortured for information. This story really makes you think about what is right and what is wrong regarding prisoners.

As a social studies teacher, this is an excellent book to have in my classroom and I think it would be very interesting and informational to create a project based on it. The students would be around the same age as Khalid so they would really be able to understand and identify with the emotions that Khalid went through.

Overall, Guantanamo Boy is a story that needs to be told and it is definitely a story that needs to be read. Even with the horrible subject matter of the novel, it will leave you with feelings of hope and forgiveness!

Khalid Ahmad is a 15 year old English boy. He watches and plays futbal, works hard at school, has strong family values and an affinity for computer games. He takes a trip to Pakistan with his family, as his father must clean up loose ends after his grandmother dies. Of course, Khalid is in Pakistan in the wake of 9/11 and is picked up for being a terrorist. He is then thrown in jail without a trail, his habeous corpus suspended -- however I don't know if England has habeous corpus. Right-o. Of course, Khalid winds up in Guantanamo, which breaks several geneval laws.

What I notice about Guantanamo Boy is the underlying political statements. It is very critical of the war on terror. It is very critical of Guantanamo Bay. For the most part, I understand that criticism. However, I felt it was just a little too blatant for me. I'm not very comfortable when someone forces their political opinion on me. Yet, I do think what Perera has done in raising awareness about the unfair practices of Guantanamo Bay is fabulous.

One thing which bothered me, it may not bother you, was the graphic descriptions of the torture Khalid underwent. I'm conflicted as I write this because I especially found it disturbing. However, I suppose being edgy is necessary to get the point across about just how bad torture is, and how confessions extracted under duress aren't quite real confessions at all.

Guantanmo Boy was a compelling read, but THE MESSAGE was a little too loud, clear, and blatant for me. I thought this was an average message read.½

A harrowing account of how a fifteen year old boy gets caught up in George Bush's ill conceived "war on terror". Accused of planning to bomb London afet he and some friends collaborated on the creation of a computer game, British school child, Khalid is abducted from Karachi in Pakistan, where he was visiting relatives. His CIA kidnappers will not believe he is 15, nor that he was just passing through a demonstration in Karachi to find his father. They fly him to Kandahar, where he is tortured into signing a confession that is then uses to send him to Guantanamo bay.

This is an immensely painful story - mostly because so much of it is based in real events. If anything, the inhumanity is toned down to make it suitable for young adult readers. Khalid, the protagonist, is fictional - but the story is true, and it is a book that will make you angry, depressed, frightened and sad. And yet there is a message of hope there too. Hope that we can answer evil with good, and turn away from the violence that is perpetrated against us.

This book moved me deeply. I knew it would have to - it is one of those subjects that cannot leave you untouched. But depressing as the subject material must inevitably be, and despite the evil it describes - I cannot recommend this book highly enough. There is no glossing over of unhelpful facts here. There is no wallowing in self pity or partisanship. Instead there is a story of evil, injustice, understanding, love and ultimately hope.

Khalid, a fifteen-year-old Muslim boy from Rochdale, is abducted from Pakistan while on holiday with his family. He is taken to Guantanamo Bay and held without charge, where his hopes and dreams are crushed under the cruellest of circumstances. An innocent denied his freedom at a time when Western boys are finding theirs, Khalid tries and fails to understand what's happening to him and cannot fail to be a changed young man.

A very moving and inspirational read. Anna Perera pulls no punches with this highly emotive and descriptive teenager’s novel. It isn’t until you’ve read the novel that you can reflect on the serenity from the opening scene; the clash of images in the rest of the novel will unsettle most readers. It would be good if this appears either as a whole text or as extracts on future syllabuses across many departments in schools, it offers a wealth of information to explore.

I only know of Guantanamo Bay from what I see in the media and it was good to then read in The Times and The Guardian how Perara developed the concept for the novel. Acknowledging her main source, Perara admits not wanting to use detainees’ stories as they are their stories to be told and not hers. This alone touched me but left me wondering how evocative her novel would then be; I didn’t have to wonder for long; in my opinion she has been successful at becoming a 15 year old Muslim.

Khalid is like any other teenager until a family holiday to Pakistan. A holiday he didn’t want to take and continually lets his family know this. I won’t go in to how he is abducted or the actual circumstances but I really did feel Khalid’s sense of confusion at the situation he was faced with. The narrative flows and I found it hard to put the novel down, in fact I didn’t want to as I just wanted to keep on reading about Khalid’s ordeal.

I think this book will haunt me for a long time and I will recommend it to everyone! I was reduced to tears towards the end, resulting in me needing a few moments of reflection once I’d reached the end. The novel is complete, I can’t go into much more because I don’t want to mention the outcome of the novel but I wasn’t left with any questions. A very plain cover to the novel but equally an effective cover is sure to catch many readers’ eyes on a shop’s shelves and the added touch of orange on the end of the pages adds to the impact. A very clever novel, one that would be good to read with others as you are sure to have plenty to discuss.